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U.S. government shutdown: White House may consider short-term increase in debt limit

The White House signalled on Monday that it would be open to a short-term hike in the U.S. debt limit as the United States moved a step closer to its first-ever default.

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The President made the remarks during an unexpected visit to FEMA to thank furloughed workers who were recalled to respond to Tropical Storm Karen. Linda So reports.(Reuters)

By The Associated Press

Mon., Oct. 7, 2013

WASHINGTON— The White House signalled on Monday that it would be open to a short-term hike in the U.S. debt limit as the United States moved a step closer to its first-ever default while a separate impasse, a partial government shutdown, entered its second week.

The shutdown, which centres on a fight over funding for President Barack Obama’s new health care law, has pushed hundreds of thousands of workers off the job, closed national parks and museums and stopped an array of government services.

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A default could have far bigger consequences. Economists say it could trigger a financial crisis and recession that would echo 2008 — or worse. The 2008 financial crisis plunged the country into the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Gene Sperling, a senior Obama economic adviser, reiterated a vow not to negotiate on the debt because it would sanction the threat of default as a bargaining chip and increase the chance of default in the future.

A defiant John Boehner, the Republican leader of the House of Representatives, has insisted that Obama must negotiate on changes to his health care law and spending cuts if he wants to end the shutdown and avert a default.

The uncompromising talk rattled financial markets early Monday as stocks slumped. China, which holds $1.277 trillion in U.S. Treasury bonds and stands as the United States’ biggest foreign creditor, urged that all efforts are made to avoid a default.

Sperling was pressed on whether he would rule out a two- or three-week extension on increasing the nation’s $16.7 trillion debt limit. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has warned that on Oct. 17, he exhausts the bookkeeping manoeuvrs he has been using to keep borrowing.

“There’s no question that the longer the debt limit is extended, the greater economic certainty there will be in our economy which would be better for jobs, growth and investment,” Sperling told a breakfast sponsored by the newspaper Politico. “That said, it is the responsibility of Congress to decide how long and how often they want to vote on doing that.”

Among congressional leaders, however, animosity marked the stalemate and resolution seemed elusive.

A statement from Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid accused Boehner of a credibility problem and called on him to allow a vote on a straightforward bill to re-open the government.

In response, Michael Steel, a spokesman for Boehner, said it was “time for Senate Democrats to stow their faux outrage and deal with the problems at hand. The federal government is shut down because Democrats refuse to negotiate, and the debt limit is right around the corner.”

Boehner said Sunday that he lacks the votes to pass a straightforward temporary spending bill that would keep the government operating.

Lew has warned that the budget brinkmanship was “playing with fire” and implored Congress to pass legislation to re-open the government and increase the nation’s debt limit.

The one bright spot on Monday is a significant chunk of the furloughed federal workforce is headed back to work. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered nearly 350,000 back on the job, basing his decision on a Pentagon interpretation of a law called the Pay Our Military Act.

Those who remain at home or are working without paychecks are a step closer to getting back pay once the partial government shutdown ends. The Senate could act this week on the measure that passed the House unanimously on Saturday.

Democrats insist that Republicans could easily open the government if Boehner simply allows a vote on the emergency spending bill. Democrats argue that their 200 members in the House plus close to two dozen pragmatic Republicans would back such a bill, but the Speaker remains hamstrung by conservatives.

In a series of Sunday television appearances, Lew said that while Treasury expects to have $30 billion of cash on hand on Oct. 17, that money will be quickly exhausted in paying incoming bills given that the government’s payments can run up to $60 billion on a single day.

Treasury issued a report on Thursday detailing in stark terms what could happen if the government actually defaulted on its obligations to service the national debt.

Private economists generally agree that a default on the U.S. debt would be extremely harmful, especially if the impasse was not resolved quickly.

“If they don’t pay on the debt, that would cost us for generations to come,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. He said a debt default would be a “cataclysmic” event that would roil financial markets in the United States and around the world.

Zandi said that holders of U.S. Treasury bonds would demand higher interest rates which would cost the country hundreds of billions of dollars in higher interest payments in coming years on the national debt.

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